Hey guys,
it's been a while since I've posted here and i don't really know how to say it.....but i don't like my mba anymore. I mean sure it's super gorgeous and ultra portable but I find it to be too limiting. SSD's are still very expensive for me to upgrade to a higher capacity and the 11 incher is too small for my personal tastes and I foud myself going back to my iMac a lot because of that.

Well, long story short, I listed the Air on ebay and ordered myself a 13.3 inch MBP, again. I had the 2010 version but I sold that because I wanted to play around with the Airs. I know the extra 2 pounds or so on the Pro will definitely be noticeable, I'm looking forward to being able to store all of my media on my notebook and sort of, see things easier.

I do apologize for my poor grammar skills....I'm an econ major and just too lazy.

Hey guys,
it's been a while since I've posted here and i don't really know how to say it.....but i don't like my mba anymore. I mean sure it's super gorgeous and ultra portable but I find it to be too limiting. SSD's are still very expensive for me to upgrade to a higher capacity and the 11 incher is too small for my personal tastes and I foud myself going back to my iMac a lot because of that.

Well, long story short, I listed the Air on ebay and ordered myself a 13.3 inch MBP, again. I had the 2010 version but I sold that because I wanted to play around with the Airs. I know the extra 2 pounds or so on the Pro will definitely be noticeable, I'm looking forward to being able to store all of my media on my notebook and sort of, see things easier.

I do apologize for my poor grammar skills....I'm an econ major and just too lazy.

What do you guys think? Good decision?

It always depends on your needs. Personaly if I were you, I would've opted for a 512GB Macbook Air 13.3 inch but if you feel that the MBP is better bet for you, there is nothing wrong with that.

I can probably quote u a study where people tend to access 10% of the information day-in day-out and the rest just sit there for occasionals.

If the rest of that stuff you don't need to take it with you wherever you go and it's OK for them to be at home, a home file server is my thing, where you can have data storage only limited by your budget, and readily accessible via WIFI.

I know the Core i5 in the Pro is a theoretically a lot faster than the ULV i% in the Air....but will the lack of SSD slow it down enough for me to notice or will it feel faster in everyday tasks?

You will notice the speed, it is much slower. However, the MBP is very easy to upgrade. You can put in an SSD when you can afford one. If you don't find yourself using the DVD drive much you can buy a drive caddy for $10-15 and put a traditional hard drive in the DVD slot so you can have the speed of an SSD and the storage space of a traditional hard drive.

I debated for a few weeks over what Mac laptop I wanted. I waited until the 13" rMBP was unveiled so I had that as an option, but the 128 GB SSD with no other storage is just too small, and the price is too high. It's a gorgeous Mac, but not right for me. So I ordered a stock 13" MBP, upgraded the RAM to 16 GB for $90 (you can find better deals than that), installed an old SSD I had lying around (you can buy a 128 GB SSD for around $100 these days, sometimes even lower), and spent the $15 on the drive caddy and moved the stock HD to the optical bay. I bought the MBP from Amazon for $1099 with no tax, so with all the other upgrades, even if I had to buy an SSD, that's about $1300-50 to max it out. It's not as light as a MBA, but it's not a sled either, and it's very fast. The best part is you can upgrade as you can afford it, you don't have to do it all at once.

If you do decide to install an SSD, your best choices for brands are Samsung 830's, Crucial M4's, or OWC. Stay away from OCZ SSD's, the failure rate is catastrophic.

I swapped my 2010 13" MBP for a 2011 11" Air, and I wouldn't go back. The screen on the 13" Pro isn't good enough (the 13" Air and rMPB are better), and my iTunes library is now 1.4TB and growing, so I couldn't hold all my stuff on it anyway.

Well guys, i did end up seeling the Air and got the MBP. I actually really love the Pro, brings back good memories. The screen is great....I dont have to keep making the text bigger, the colors look great, and the battery life is great! I do notice that the apps take a little longer to launch and the computer is a little hazier, but hey, life is a bunch of trade-offs when all youve got to spend is $1200.

Well guys, i did end up seeling the Air and got the MBP. I actually really love the Pro, brings back good memories. The screen is great....I dont have to keep making the text bigger, the colors look great, and the battery life is great! I do notice that the apps take a little longer to launch and the computer is a little hazier, but hey, life is a bunch of trade-offs when all youve got to spend is $1200.

-jay

Glad to hear you're happy with your purchase. And you're completely right about there still being tradeoffs between the MBA and MBP. It just depends on which stuff you're willing to compromise on. In an ideal world, I would have both.

__________________I have a dream that one day iOS users, Android users, and Windows Phone users will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.Xbox Live/PSN: ClassyPandaBear

Glad to hear you're happy with your purchase. And you're completely right about there still being tradeoffs between the MBA and MBP. It just depends on which stuff you're willing to compromise on. In an ideal world, I would have both.

I was thinking about using my 2010 MBP 15" as my "desktop" and buy a MBA 11" for when I'm on campus / at work and then eventually upgrade my MBP to an iMac -- Ideally, I would have the money